Distillers, brewers and wineries pour millions of dollarsinto brand promotion on Twitter, Facebook and othersocial media, and industry critics contend they are not doingenough to prevent young consumers from receiving these messages.

"We're doing a deep dive on how they're using the Internetand social media," said Janet Evans, a lawyer with the FTC,which is conducting a year-long study due to be released byearly summer. "We're focusing on underage exposure."

She would not elaborate on any potential recommendationsthat might come out of the study, which began in April 2012.

The FTC is reviewing data from 14 big producers, Evans said,including Beam Inc, the maker of Jim Beam, Diageo Plc, home to Johnnie Walker, and Constellation Brands Inc, which makes Robert Mondavi and Ravenswood wines.

The FTC report "is something we take seriously and place athigh priority," said Karena Breslin, director for digitalmarketing at Constellation.

The FTC has made two requests for information since thestudy began, she said.

The regulatory agency has not said it intends to imposerestrictions on liquor company social media advertising but itcan make recommendations to the industry.

The FTC is empowered to file suit to ensure consumers areprotected from deceptive marketing practices, Evans said, butshe stressed that studies of this nature are meant to promotebetter self-regulation, not provide a basis for a case.

Industry executives say alcohol makers and distributorsvoluntarily adhere to the same industry-set standard formarketing to underage viewers on social media sites that theindustry set for its ads on TV and other media. That requiresthat at least 71.6 percent of an audience consists of adults 21and older.

"No one in their right mind would want to advertise topeople who can't legally buy their product," said Frank Coleman,senior vice president for Distilled Spirits Council of theUnited States (DISCUS), the trade group that sets the industry'sadvertising codes.

"According to Nielsen's latest data, the demographicaudience for Facebook is 83.5 percent 21 years and older, andfor Twitter it is 85 percent," Coleman said.

In June 2011, DISCUS revised its code upwards to 71.6percent from 70 percent, after the FTC recommended it review thestandard to better reflect U.S. Census population data.

Industry critics, including David Jernigen, director of theCenter on Alcohol Marketing and Youth at Johns HopkinsUniversity, and Sarah Mart, research director of the advocacygroup Alcohol Justice, contend the industry didn't go far enoughand should raise the standard further.

Jernigen said it needs to be at least 85 percent toeffectively protect youth, so there would be no more than 15percent exposure to the underage drinking population.

"The industry says its self-regulating but it's ineffectiveand social media opens up a whole new set of problems becausetheir ads are everywhere," said Mart.

Coleman said the group now requires members to installage-checking tools via instant messaging as a gateway to Twitterfeeds and other branded Web platforms that ask the user for abirth date before admitting them.

In the first nine months of 2012, beer, wine and spiritsmanufacturers spent an estimated $35 million for paid Webdisplay advertising, but industry executives estimate manymillions more were spent on website creation, video productionfor platforms like Google's YouTube and social mediamarketing efforts.

Many companies are expanding their digital staff. Wine makerConstellation hired Breslin three years ago to initiate digitalmarketing and now has a team of five reporting to her.

Many alcoholic beverage companies flocked to Facebookbecause it requires users to post their birth dates when signingup.

Last year Twitter partnered with Buddy Media to offer ascreening tool that sends a direct message to fans who click onan alcoholic brand. The message sends the fan a link to a sitethat asks for date of birth.

Salesforce.com bought Buddy Media last June, whichis now folding the platform into its marketing cloud portfolio.

Health advocates and industry critics are crying foul. "Facebook and other interactive platforms are poorly monitoredand not well age-protected," said Jernigen of Johns HopkinsUniversity. "Anyone can say they're 21 and click yes."